


"Annabel Lee" vs. the World

by Gray Cardinal (Gray_Cardinal)



Category: Velveteen - Seanan McGuire
Genre: F/F, Misses Clause Challenge, Portland Oregon, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-07 22:04:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5472293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gray_Cardinal/pseuds/Gray%20Cardinal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"For good or ill, Victoria Cogsworth and ‘Victory Anna’ are one and the same in this world.”  Torrey did not quite sigh, but the intent hung in the air nonetheless.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	"Annabel Lee" vs. the World

**Author's Note:**

  * For [palmedfire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/palmedfire/gifts).



> **Disclaimer:** _Velveteen and the universe(s) she and her friends occupy are the creations of Seanan McGuire._
> 
>  **Note:** _This story takes place while Velma/Velveteen is experiencing her Seasonal trials._

**Portland, Oregon • inner east side**

For at least the third time that week, eleven customers were crowded into two of the supermarket’s five checkout lanes. “Our computers are down in One and Four,” a harried-looking cashier was explaining to a woman with one child in a stroller, one in her cart, and a third eyeing the candy display like a cat stalking a robin. “And the receipt printer in Two toasted itself yesterday. We’re waiting on a replacement.”

The customer gave him an equally harried look in return. “Yes, well, you need to do _something_. I can’t keep shopping here – however much I want to – if this keeps up.”

“From your lips to Corporate’s ears,” the cashier replied, his tone more sympathetic than hopeful.

Quite understandably, neither of them was paying attention to the petite woman seated quietly some distance away, at one of the three little tables next to the store’s deli counter. A thoughtful observer might have wondered why she had brought a notebook computer – on whose keyboard her fingers tapped with brisk efficiency – to a business not equipped with wi-fi. One paying especially close attention might have noticed a slightly odd-looking device plugged into one of the notebook’s USB ports. In most respects the object resembled an ordinary thumb drive – but this one was a bit larger than most, and had open connectors on both ends.

As it was, no one took note when she folded up the computer a half hour or so later, tucked it into a black canvas messenger bag, and strode off into the overcast Portland afternoon.

An hour after she left, the store’s two surviving checkout terminals went black simultaneously...for the space of fifteen seconds. Then they came back up – and so did the computers in lanes Two, Three, and Five, with every terminal showing a crisp new interface. And all five receipt printers, including the supposedly fried unit in Two, spat out a three-inch slip bearing the image of a single horseshoe and the words:

_Compliments of Annabel Lee_

A team of three techs from the chain’s corporate IT department spent the next three weeks trying without success to figure out precisely what “Annabel Lee” had done. The store’s on-site computers were now working flawlessly and without interruption, and happily accepting their daily downloads from Corporate’s servers. But access to the underlying software had been thoroughly blocked, and when the lead tech tried to open the store server, she discovered that the unit had somehow been physically sealed shut.

#

**a city park in the western suburbs**

Most of the neighborhood was watching as a grapple loader scooped up debris and dropped it into the bed of an enormous yellow dump trunk. Two days before, this corner of the park had been home to a cluster of play structures large and versatile enough to accommodate a medium-sized horde of youngsters – swings, slides both straight and spiraled, a sand pit, a three-level climbing fort, a roundabout, and so on.

That had been before the overnight thunderstorm, during which a dramatic lightning strike had caused a spectacularly improbable chain reaction. The bolt had hit an enormous tree a block away near the crest of a small hill, causing the top fifteen feet of said tree to shear off and swan-dive at exactly the right angle to take out an electric-company transformer station half a block to the southwest. On the plus side, the resulting explosion utterly vaporized the tree rather than blasting splinters of evergreen-scented shrapnel in every possible direction. Unfortunately, however, the _KAAA-BOOOOM!!_ was sufficiently violent to knock over every power pole within another half-block radius. Of the fourteen poles thus affected, nine simply toppled over without causing significant property damage. Two had their falls broken by unfortunately placed parked cars. One just missed the home of a family of five recently arrived from Illinois, taking out a hedge, a bicycle, and two mailboxes. One landed squarely on the back porch of a local meteorologist, who was at that moment broadcasting a “breaking news” weather alert from her TV studio several miles away. But the fourteenth and last power pole landed neatly sideways on a steeply sloped cul-de-sac and rolled briskly down the hill, gathering enough momentum as it went to strike and shoot several cars right across the cross street at the bottom of the hill and into the playground. Only one of the vehicles actually exploded, but the combined impact was enough to thoroughly demolish everything in the play area.

The weathercaster’s employers had a news truck on scene, with reporters interviewing adults and children alike. This included a just-arrived Beaverton city council member, who was explaining to the weathercaster herself that “regrettably, funds are tight enough just now that we won’t be able to even begin rebuilding for at least six months.”

Neither the TV teams nor the government officials paid much attention to the solitary bicyclist who came pedaling along the street, saw the heavy equipment at work, and stopped to watch for some fifteen minutes. She listened inconspicuously but with interest to several conversations among the locals, and took particular note of one nine-year-old boy cradling a yellow toy dump truck in his arms before remounting her bicycle and continuing on her way.

The next morning, the entire neighborhood was gathered at the park again...this time to marvel at the entirely new cluster of play structures that had mysteriously appeared overnight. There were swings, two spiral slides and a chute, a network of tube-tunnels, a complicated _four­_ -level climbing fort with a compact enclosed room in the middle, not one but two roundabout wheels. A dark green pennant with a golden horseshoe design flew from the topmost corner of the fort, and a brass plaque mounted next to one of the slides read simply _Compliments of Annabel Lee._

#

**a city park in north Portland  
**

_Things Unseen_ had been filming locally for six years, and the latest episode was something of a thank-you to the show’s incredibly loyal fan base. Well over a hundred extras had been recruited to play a variety of roles, including a handful of medieval re-enactors whose hobby was a key point in the episode’s B plot.

But: “We’ve got a problem,” an assistant told the on-set producer as the latter approached the craft services tent. “The caterer says his whole operation’s down. Apparently somebody in park maintenance accidentally took out both his main electric cable and a gas line last night, and we didn’t find out till half an hour ago. So not only is his cook tent hosed, but he’s gotta toss everything he had in not-so-cold storage.”

The producer blanched. “If we can’t feed the army we’ve got here today, we’re going to lose a Hell of a lot of goodwill, not to mention what it’ll cost to try and pull in some kind of substitute.”

A few yards away, a slight figure wearing a red beret, a dark green _Wicked Girls_ T-shirt and black jeans looked up sharply, then produced a compact from her purse and opened it. After gazing into its mirror for a full two minutes, she snapped it shut, then slipped quietly around to the back of the cook tent.

Twenty minutes later, the caterer blinked in surprise as he heard the series of small huffing and crackling noises that meant his grills were coming to life. And on the heels of that sound came another: around a corner that should have been too tight for vehicles that size to navigate came not one but two refrigerator vans, each bearing a logo that said _Northern Express_. The drivers proceeded to unload enough food to feed the army of extras – and to fill the pantries of three neighborhood churches besides – but resisted all attempts at payment. Only at the very end of the day, when the caterer began the process of shutting down and packing away his gear, did he discover the two black metal cubes bolted onto the backs of his own refrigerator equipment and grills, and realize that both sets of equipment had been running all afternoon without having been reconnected to either electrical or gas lines. Neatly etched into each box: a golden horseshoe design and the letters _A. L._.

“Annabel Lee,” the producer’s assistant said softly.

#

**the house assigned to Velma "Velveteen" Martinez**

“Annabel Lee, my ass,” Yelena said several hours later, watching the late local news. “That was you, wasn’t it?”

The compact red-haired figure curled next to her on the sofa tilted her head upward. “And if it was?” Victoria Cogsworth inquired mildly.

Yelena arched an eyebrow. “Speaking as someone on her third hero-ID, I guess I can’t criticize. That said – color me surprised. I didn’t think you had a subtle bone in your body, and ‘Annabel Lee’ has been the Queen of Subtle pretty much all summer.” She paused, stroking the other woman’s hair. “What brought this on, anyway?”

There was a brief silence. Then Torrey spoke softly. “I have been wanting...to feel at home. Not in this house,” she added hastily, “but in this world.”

“Ah.” Yelena sucked in a breath. “Only ‘Victory Anna’ is awfully damned conspicuous – and at the same time, she’s pretty much the real you.”

“Precisely. For good or ill, Victoria Cogsworth and ‘Victory Anna’ are one and the same in this world.” Torrey did not quite sigh, but the intent hung in the air nonetheless.

“But put on sweats and sneakers and maybe a wig,” Yelena said, her fingers gently kneading Torrey’s shoulders, “and you become pretty much invisible. You can go out and experience ‘normal’ the way the rest of us do.”

Torrey looked up at her lover with an amused expression. “To a degree, at least. And I can do small things – for relative values of ‘small’,” she amended, “to be of service to those who have taken me in. There is some precedent in your _Arabian Nights,_ wherein the great Caliph wanders his city in disguise, and thereby sees his subjects more directly than he might in his own person.”

“I totally get it,” said Yelena. “That said – you took a bit of a risk this time, calling in a favor from Jackie. _Northern Express_ , obvious much?”

“A little, perhaps. It would have been _North Polar Express_ , but I rearranged the paint molecules at the last moment.”

“Good call,” Yelena said. “So, has it helped?”

Torrey fell silent for several moments. “It is beginning to. Do not worry,” she added abruptly. “I have no desire to become ordinary Annabel Lee in more than occasional fashion. But I want very much to know this world as you do, and that I believe I can accomplish through her eyes.”

Yelena’s eyes had gone a little misty. “And mine, I hope.”

“And yours,” Torrey said, punching the TV remote’s Off switch.

# # #


End file.
